Today’s recipe is my French bistro-style lentil soup with bacon, made with smoky bacon in whose rendered fat I sauté onion and garlic, along with celery, carrots, and parsley. And to give it that distinctive French touch, I add butter to the vegetable sofrito. It’s a soup as comforting as it is nourishing, and best of all: it’s ready in 40 minutes!
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Eating like in Paris
I once heard my dear Mayte Navarro, a journalist and social chronicler from Caracas, say that when she felt like eating as if she were in Paris, but going to a French restaurant wasn’t in the cards, her husband Alberto would make bistro-style onion soup, they’d uncork a bottle of wine, light the candles et voila: la vie en rose!
The same thing happens to me with this lentil soup, which is the closest thing to what they’d serve in a brasserie in France (although my kids say it would be better if I made an entrecôte accompagnée des frites).
The thing is, I love lentils however they come: with Spanish chorizo and potatoes, with cilantro, in a good majadra, in salads, and of course I can’t resist a good lentil soup with bacon the way the French eat it.
Bon appétit!
Enri
Ingredients
- Smoked bacon
- Onion
- Garlic
- Fresh parsley
- Butter
- Carrots
- Celery
- Coarse sea salt
- Freshly ground white pepper
How to make French Bistro-Style Lentil Soup with Bacon
- Cook the lentils. Rinse the lentils and cook them in water.
- Prepare the sofrito. In a skillet, cook the bacon until golden, then sauté the onion, garlic, and parsley in its fat until the onions wilt.
- Add butter and vegetables. Incorporate the butter, carrots, and celery, add a couple cups of the lentil cooking water, and simmer everything.
- Season and finish cooking. Remove the parsley, add the bacon and vegetable sofrito to the lentils, season with salt and pepper, and cook until the lentils are tender.
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French Bistro-Style Lentil Soup with Bacon
Ingredients
- 1 pound lentils 450 g
- 1/2 lb smoked bacon, frozen and finely chopped 115 g
- 1 onion, finely chopped 160 g
- 2 garlic cloves, minced 10 g
- 4 sprigs parsley
- 3 tablespoons butter 45 g
- 2 carrots, finely diced 200 g
- 2 stalks celery 100 g
- 8 cups water 2 lt
- Coarse sea salt
- Freshly ground white pepper
Instructions
- In a pot over medium heat, add the water and the previously rinsed lentils, and cook for 20 minutes.
- In a skillet over medium heat, add the bacon and cook, stirring constantly, for about 3 minutes.
- Add the onion, garlic, and parsley, and cook until the onions wilt, about 5 minutes.
- Add the butter, carrots, and celery.
- Take two cups of the water where the lentils are cooking and add it to the bacon and vegetable mixture, cook over low heat for 5 minutes.
- Discard the parsley and add the bacon and vegetables to the soup.
- Season with salt and pepper and cook over low heat until the lentils are tender, about 10 more minutes.
Nutrition
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